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This week's guest on all about business is Giles Bristow, CEO of Surfers Against Sewage, a water reform charity that’s been around for over three decades.
In this episode, James and Giles discuss the dangers of not taking sustainability seriously, how to get the government to sit up and listen and why community lies at the heart of every charitable brand.
About Giles
Giles Bristow is the CEO of Surfers Against Sewage, a marine conservation charity. Founded in 1990 by a group of surfers in Cornwall, SAS is a powerful environmental movement that addresses a range of ocean-related issues. Giles joined SAS in 2023 and has over 20 years of experience in environmental advocacy.
01:31 introduction
02:22 what are the problems with the UK's oceans?
08:32 recent environmental changes
10:41 why can't water companies solve this?
13:38 time for systemic change
16:45 voters against floaters
31:31 Giles' advice for effective campaigning
36:42 circular economies
38:53 plastic - it's everywhere
40:40 how to lobby - transparency and connections
45:52 Just Stop Oil – are the effective?
50:22 helping businesses become more sustainable
53:55 community and brand
59:19 interview round
Links
Check out SAS’s website: https://www.sas.org.uk/
Follow Giles on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/giles-bristow-aa284927/
Follow James Reed on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/chairmanjames/
James: [00:00:00] Welcome to All About Business with me, James Reed, the podcast that covers everything about business management and leadership.
The UK is ranked last in Europe for bathing water quality with a small team and limited resources. However, a bunch of surfers from St. Agnes in Cornwall got parliament to listen and then launch a parliamentary commission into England's chemical cocktail of stinking sewage. Joining me today on all about business is Giles Bristow, CEO of Surfers Against Sewage, a water reform charity that's been around for over three decades now.
Coming up, we discussed the dangers of not taking sustainability seriously, how to get the government to sit up and listen, and why community lies at the heart of every charitable brand. Well, today on all About business, I'm really delighted to welcome Giles Bristow to the [00:01:00] studio. Giles is the CEO of a fantastic charity that I've been a supporter of for a, a number of years now called Surfers Against Sewage and Giles.
Thank you. You've, you've come all the way from Cornwall and you've brought a surfboard with you. Yep. With Cornish sand on it and, and a mask that, uh, uh, demonstrates the need for clean water. 'cause you won't wanna wear that when you go swimming and a banner that says, sick of Sewage, which is our new tablecloth for those watches.
So thank you for bringing these things along. Most importantly, thank you for coming. My pleasure. Delighted that you are here. We talk about sorting out some pretty big problems. Yeah. Most importantly, you are a marine conservation organization that's trying to protect the oceans and the rivers and water generally from pollution and sewage.
What's the root cause of the problem here and what are we up against?
Giles: Oh my goodness. What are we up against? That's, that is a big question, but I would say what are we up against? The way we treat the ocean is toxic. I. That's the way we think about it. So there's an imbalance of [00:02:00] power here. There are large organizations that haven't internalized the cost, if you like, of the way they're treating the ocean.
So whether we're talking about overfishing, whether we're talking about deep sea mining, whether we're talking about, uh, you know, the banner on the table is about sewage. So the way we treat and dispose of our wastewater, uh, or the impacts of climate change. So a lot of these are driven, if you like, at that highest level by big businesses.
And, you know, an increasing population impacting on the globe, and the seas are vulnerable. They're really, really vulnerable. Every second breath we take is oxygen created by the ocean. More of the earth is, um, sea than it is land. We should really call it Planet Sea, not planet Earth. And it's a very vulnerable environment that looks after us.
It gives us protein. It regulates out the temperature and the salinity of our water, uh, the temperature of the globe. The other thing is, as human beings, we all, we love it. We have this amazing relationship with the sea. It's quite rare to meet [00:03:00] someone who doesn't have passion for the ocean and the sea.
So a root cause is a very systemic set of issues, but it's really the way we treat. The ocean isn't right. But as interestingly as individuals, the way we relate to the ocean though is still positive and healthy. So there's a kind of strange dichotomy if you like, there it seems though we still
James: treat the ocean as a dust spin.
Really? Yeah, we do. People chuck things in the sea. We do Because it's so big perhaps and it disappears underwater and people forget about stuff.
Giles: Yeah, you are absolutely right. And you know, we give thanks to people like Jacque Cousteau who brought it to our TV screens back in the, what was it, sixties and seventies.
Uh, for the first time really uncovering I. What it was like underwater, just the sheer brilliance and the biodiversity, and then science as well, you know, starting to, um, uncover what's the ocean really means for our very existence. You are right outta sight out of mind. We've dumped nuclear waste in the ocean, industrial [00:04:00] chemicals in the ocean.
Uh, we consistently in constantly think that diluting pollution in the ocean is fine and it will just go away. But the more we learn, the more we realize that that just isn't the case. You know, um, biodiversity. So animals in the ocean are bio accumulating, you know, nuclear material forever, chemicals, plastics.
This doesn't stop with them. We ingest this protein. We are all ingesting plastic, not only from the ocean, not only from fish through the air, we breathe and so all sorts of things. But via the ocean, we are accumulating toxins in ourselves. You can test almost any human being. We have microplastics in our blood and we have PFAS forever Chemicals in our blood.
It's causing all sorts of, well, we're sitting on a public health time bomb, potentially. Plastics and microplastics provide a microenvironment for harmful bacteria and viruses to breed and to change. So I mean, it's, the problem stemming from how we treat the ocean is multiple and, and manifest. So we're [00:05:00] dealing with big, wicked systemic issues and that's, we exist therefore to.
Try and protect and restore the ocean. Be the voice for the ocean, because surface against su, we're, we're a tiny organization. We're 54 people, principally based in corn in St. Agnes. But we represent a massive movement of what we call ocean activists. So hundreds of thousands of people around the country who care about the ocean, deeply, passionately, 'cause they're in love with the ocean.
Uh, and at the same time, you know, feel anger, I guess in part. And they want to turn that anger into action. They want to campaign with us. We protest together, we paddle out together, uh, in the surf, uh, and we party together. We have a ball coming up in St. Agnes, uh, on the 5th of July, uh, which is a celebration of our community.
We'll have 3000 people. And you're invited, James. Please do come. I'm fantastic.
James: It's a July our hand and I can't do that Dave. 'cause my wife's having a birthday party. Oh, bring the party, bring the parties. Magnets. No, that sounds great. I think. Yeah, but that's, there'll be some
Giles: surfing involved there. There will be.
There'll be [00:06:00] definitely surfing. There'll be, there'll be some surf stars there. We've got some great bands and some DJs. But it really is, for us, it's about people power. It's about community. It's about people joining together and to be the voice of the ocean. The ocean doesn't have its own voice, but because we love it, we are that voice and we speak out for it.
We are operating at the intersection of the environmental issues and human health. So where we really major, it's where. The issues affect us when we get in the water. 'cause that's what's particular about us as surfers and swimmers and paddlers and others. But when we get into the water and we are exposed to toxic or harmful chemicals or bacteria, in the case of sewage, we are like the canaries in the coal mine, if you like.
Yes. Um, so if we can get ill and we do constant earaches, sickness, that kind of thing, or worse if it's chemical and pollution, but where we are, the canary in the coal mines, we are a signal for that. The wider environment is. [00:07:00] Under threat and we see it visually. We've emerged from COVID. People have gone back out into their natural environment and loving it.
You know, this massive meteoric rise of wild swimming, but also paddle sports. About 17 million people a year in the UK enjoy going into these environments to do paddle sports in some form on a regular basis. That's enormous number. We've seen the huge rise of surfing in its popularity. And as we emerged from COVID, we went back to places we love Beaches, river Banks, lakesides, and we went, hang on, this doesn't look like we remember it because we've seen a rapid, particularly in relation to surge pollution decline in these places because of the effects of sewage and agriculture pollution and other toxins.
And in front of our eyes, we are seeing huge degradation of these environments and people were shocked. So that's why it's the car erosion. So this is that
James: rapidly you're saying rapidly. Why is that? Well, I mean, what's changed in the last five years?
Giles: So. If you like, crossing a tipping point. So we have seen [00:08:00] massive underinvestment by the water companies.
We've seen the rise of agricultural pollution along the banks of the river y uh, chicken, uh, farms and this kind of thing. So huge growth in planning permission for agricultural farming that has a direct impact on our rivers. But we've seen rapid and increased development, so a lot of road runoff, um, and houses.
You know, this, this means that, um, rain runs off hard surface more quickly into rivers, meaning our sewage infrastructure is, um, overwhelmed. Uh, and that causes more sewage to go into rivers, lakes in, in the sea. And we've had climate change. Like our climate is changing rapidly. So we've had much wetter, um, warmer, wetter winters.
We are more ferocious if you like, uh, downpours Denis of water. So we've seen that flooding across the UK far more intense than we've seen had four years. So those things coming together means that the infrastructure that we have and the planning that we've done for the future has just not kept up with what we need.
And at the same time, in particular in the water sector, the privatized nature of that [00:09:00] sector has meant that the water companies have prioritized making a profit and creating dividends for shareholders and not invested sufficiently in the environment. So we've seen this kind of a crisis in the environment, uh, and a crisis of financing of the infrastructure that we need to see take place.
So it's been, if you like, a perfect storm of things that's led to crash. I'm worried that, I mean, because the
James: climate change you said is happening fast. Yeah. That doesn't seem to be anything immediately. We're a path to stop it. Yeah. And then we we're told we're gonna be building a million new homes in the uk.
Yeah. There's a lot of, and the development's gonna be made more easy. Mm-hmm. And, um, you know, the, the wider situation is. With the water companies is unresolved. You know, there's, it's not like they've suddenly got an injection of huge amounts of capital as far as I can see, or that they've got a new approach.
So ass, an organization like yours gonna do anything about a problem as big as that, I suppose is a, I mean, I, so that's a great question, great [00:10:00] spirit, but I mean, what, I mean, come on. How are
Giles: we
James: gonna really make
Giles: this change, James? That's a, that's a really, really, really good question because like how can 50 people odd from, that's, I'm thinking
James: 57 you said, right?
That's
Giles: right. And yeah, and we are, and, and you can change the world with 57. We change, change world, but how are we gonna do it? And we are not aiming for tinkering around the edges either. We are aiming for systemic reform. So when we think of, okay, we have to sort of slightly break up the different issues, but when we think of the crisis, the sewage crisis, what we know is.
The current system is broken. It was broken back in the nineties when it was a nationalized system, and Margaret Thatcher privatized it because we needed a huge investment injection of capital to bring very aged Victorian infrastructure up to date and not a bad job. To be honest, at the beginning, at the very beginning, um, the sewage infrastructure licenses were given to private companies.
Um, we all could own some of that utility investment. Um, and it was a huge new sewage, uh, uh,
James: pipe built in London. I remember,
Giles: ah, oh, [00:11:00] the, well that's happening sort of now. Got the Thames Tide project, and that's, that's quite recent. But, but back in the day, in the, in the early nineties, so Margaret, I noticed that Margaret Thatcher, her plan was we could all own some of this utility infrastructure and benefit from its ownership.
So, I dunno if you remember the, the don't Tell Sid campaign, you know about British Gas Pro? Oh yeah. So popular shareholding. Yeah, exactly. Now at that point, that was a great way to put new, um, inject a huge, vast amount of capital into, um, our sewage infrastructure. And the government put 5 billion pounds, which by then at that time was a huge amount of money into environmental, uh, investment.
Unfortunately, what's happened over time is that those shareholdings have moved. We all sold them. I'd say we wasn't quite there at the time, but we sold them. Um, they were sucked up by pension companies and others. Um, and then over time, financial innovation. We saw the rise of securitization and bungee schemes and tax efficient schemes and all these kinda different things.
And the investors in our utility infrastructure, which by the way is [00:12:00] meant to be like utilitarian. It's meant to be low risk, low reward. Space rates, you know, ticks along the bottom. You'd love it in your pension 'cause you know where it's gonna be. Yeah. It gives you reliable returns, an absolutely reliable return.
And, um, it's based on customer bills. We could pretty much know what they are. We know how many people roughly there will be. So it's, it's highly predictable. But what happened over time is the risk of investing in utilities changed. By the nature of the investors that got into the system. So we started to extract more, which slightly increased the risk around the return on those investments as we started to take more out.
And then debts were, they were geared up, heavily geared up. We see thas water now hugely geared up, and now 35 pence in our pound on a customer bill goes to servicing debt or dividends. So that's phenomenal. It's more than a third of the pound we could have put in, which means there's no space for after you pay for running the company, et cetera, and day to day maintenance and IT infrastructure and billing, et cetera.
The amount of money that's available to go into environmental restoration is small. [00:13:00] So this, so systemic change is required. Ah. So we need systemic change now. We are not calling for nationalization. We are calling for systemic change. We are just a bunch of surfers from the west country. Right. But we've been leaning in, we've been doing our homework on finance, we've been trying to understand systemic risk.
We're trying to understand where the money's going to and who benefits and. But the general election last year in the run up to the general election, uh, we got a double decker boss. We wrapped it in surface against sewage logos on the back, it said voters against floaters. And we went and engaged people everywhere.
Yeah. And we said, look, this is a major issue. Your rivers are dying. There's a crisis sorted out. And we engaged politicians across the country. They gave us their, or in return for promises to protect the ocean and to sort this mess out. Effectively, we gave them their votes. And we have stuffed parliament full of pro ocean, um, pro-environmental restoration mps.
They owe their seats to a large extent, and many of them, 'cause [00:14:00] they said they'll tackle this situation. So we said, great. After the election, Steve Reed or, well first of all, ki on the steps of Downing Street, sort of, you know, page one paragraph, one sentence one was this is the government's gonna sort out this sewage crisis.
Then Steve Reed, the, the, uh, secretary of State for the environment said he has two priorities. First one sort out sewage crisis, the second one to bring in a circular economy into, um, the uk, which is great 'cause the other area that we are campaigning hard on is plastic pollution and waste. So we were really delighted with that and Steve Reed followed that up really rapidly with a, the water special measures bill.
And we had a private briefing along with other NGOs, uh, about that bill. It was it they were about to announce, and when they told us the measures, we said, well. This is good. It's tightening up, it's putting a bit more spotlight on the execs. It's putting 'em under a bit more pressure, making 'em a bit more liable for environmental pollution that's going on.
Fines could increase and this kind of thing, but it wasn't gonna transform the system. And we said, right, [00:15:00] what you've got to do is have a commission on water 'cause we need to air this dirty laundry in public. That's what we were arguing for. The public knows something's wrong. They need to understand just how wrong, so we can see just how broken the system is so long.
And the short of it is two days later in Putney, secretary of State announced an independent water commission on water. So those 50 people campaigning in Cornwall with the mandate and reach of hundreds of thousands of supporters and putting that political pressure on got that water commission. And so since then we've been presenting evidence, both environmental evidence and data and sickness data and all that kind of good stuff, as well as finance data, borrowings data, um, evidence around CEOs and boards, these privatized water companies, their management and decision making, and sort of we've been.
Pushing that. Some of that is perverse because it's being driven by profit, not about wider sense of environment, environmental protection. So that commission is about to report literally any day now. And then that'll [00:16:00] become the recommendations for government, for the reform of the industry and governments promised, uh, a water industry reform bill.
So I've got lots of questions arising
James: from that
Giles: summary.
James: So firstly, voters against Floaters, that's a great slogan. Thank you. Who thought of it? Was it you or where did that come from?
Giles: I don't know. I dunno where that came from. We, we, as you can imagine when you are, um, dealing with sewage, we spend a lot of time coming up with pens and stuff.
And so we do swear quite a lot as well. Um, that's alright. You listeners don't mind out. That's
James: part Well, but cut the crap,
Giles: you know, end the shit. Show voters against floaters. Oh. You know, these are all things that allow people a way into this problem. Yeah.
James: Yeah. Well that, that and so this commission,
Giles: yeah.
James: How does that work? Who's, who's part, who's leading the commission politically?
Giles: Across the spectrum. So it's an independent commissioner, sir John Cunliffe. He's the former deputy governor of the Bank of England. Right. So he worked with Mark Carney, who I have huge admiration for as someone who's doing a lot on the climate side, actually, who Mark Carney or ciff.
So Mark Carney did an awful now Prime [00:17:00] Minister of Canada. That Exactly, exactly. And I, you know, and, and I think a really decent, reasonable guy who understands that business needs to be tempered somewhat to avoid the externalities, the negative externalities of business. So he brought in tons of regulation around, um, the stock markets and the disclosure around climate effects and things.
And so John Coniff worked with him. So when I. The identity of the commissioner, sir John Coniff was announced. People sucked in air through their teeth. Like, oh really? Deputy governor of the Bank of England, how is he gonna sort out an environmental problem? Fair question. Yeah. But to be honest, we said, and I think we're a pretty lone voice, we said, well, hang on this dude.
He understands big business. He understands the drivers of finance, what it means in systemic terms. He understands management and board level decisions and behaviors. So we were quietly quite pleased. And over the time of his commission gathering evidence, um, we've got to know him a bit. We've met him five or six times.
He's come down to St. Agnes to see us in person, beat [00:18:00] Stan on the beach with us and meet water users. But can he surf? No, he can't. And I asked him if he likes to come from surf and he did decline, which is a shame. That's however we'll get him going. But what I realized talking to him and getting to know him a bit.
He's a mountaineer, so he has an affiliation, he has a passion for the natural world, and once we appreciated that, we knew it's a sidestep for him to understand how other people can just love and care for the ocean. He loves and cares about mountains. I do think he's a decent and honorable guy, and he's trying to do, and he will try and do the right thing.
I'm sure we haven't seen his recommendations yet, but we need it to, I suppose the other side of this, I mean, I hope
James: so too. Yeah, I mean, I'm a scuba diver. I love talking. Oh, right. So, but I, I hope so too. But the UK is a relatively small. Part of, you know, we've got quite a long coastline, I guess. Yeah. But you know, when you look at the world as a whole Yeah.
I mean, what's going on elsewhere? Is there any progress? Yeah. Okay. So you are
Giles: absolutely right. When we move into different issues, then yeah, we are [00:19:00] a small polluter in terms of climate, but then we've had our big climate effect. We've chopped down our trees, we've had our industrialization, um, we have, we now export our emissions effectively by bringing in, you know, products and services from the rest of the world.
So we, we still do you that
James: this is a movement that's. More global now in scope, or
Giles: is it still fairly local? So our movement is national, right? It's the four corners of the uk, but we're tapping into a broader movement that is global. So almost any poll about concern, the public are worried about climate, they're worried about biodiversity loss.
They're worried about our relationship to the natural environment. So we are definitely tapping into a broader worry that exists in humanity and society, 100% where I think we are succeeding. If I can sort of. You know, a bit of hubris there. Mm. But where I think we're succeeding is we give people something to do to turn their worries and their, or their anger into action.
Whether it's protesting with us in a fun and very family friendly way, [00:20:00] like the paddle outs around the country like we had last weekend where we got about 10,000 people out around the country to make lots of noise on the beach and to paddle out with us and to really enjoy that. But it gives people a sense of agency where we feel powerless quite often in the face of climate change or plastic pollution or even sewage pollution.
I think we give people some hope because they enter into a community, um, so they feel part of something and feeling part of something can make you feel more bold and. I am gonna write to my mp. I am gonna demand that they join the surface against S Surge cross parliamentary group, or I am going to make my voice known and protest outside my water company because I care that they're chucking shit in my river.
So I think we could give people a sense of hope and agency. We also hope that we are building some form of campaigning capacity across. Communities, we train people as citizen scientists to test their local water. Citizen scientists. Citizen scientists, yeah. So to do water quality monitoring, testing, testing.
So people wanna do that. How do [00:21:00] they get in touch with us? And, uh, so where, where do they go? Then service to go to our, go to our website Surface. We have surface against sewage. And, um, we have a whole section of the website dedicated to gathering data. We will train you if we can. So there's an annual application, but we will also fund community groups to do their own water quality monitoring and testing.
And that's great because it puts the data in our hands. We follow all exactly the same, um, scientific methodology and procedures and laboratories as the environment agency do. So they can't complain or, or, you know, say, oh, you are using different techniques. But what we do do is test more frequently, more often, and in the right places where people swim and surf.
And what we always find almost without exception. What we find is the water is more polluted than we're told. So that puts data in the citizen's hands to then be able to campaign locally. So I think we're tapping into something We hope that we're tooling people up to give them agency and hope that we're giving people some hope [00:22:00] that together we can actually shift things.
So we've used the word hope a lot. Yeah. I
James: mean, what are, what are your hopes that, that this commission might table, you know, what are you hoping that will come out of the commission? That will be good news for all of us in the,
Giles: so you can guarantee that when the commission reports and the government responds, we will come out and say, that's just not good enough.
'cause we are campaigners. Okay. Yeah. Quite okay. I would be
James: disappointed if you said, oh, this is all fine in the world. '
Giles: cause it will clearly work. It'll be a small beginning. I suspect it. That's very likely to be the case. It'll be a small beginning. But failure will look like some tinkering around the edges or some reregulation.
'cause that's just not gonna cut it. That's failure. Yeah, that is failure. We have been here before, back in the mid nineties. At the last change, actually, the introduction of Tony Blair's labor government was another. That was a very positive moment for the ocean. But this government, and in this moment, it has the opportunity to transform this broken.
System. It staked its claim on growth in the economy as the way to build our way outta a lot of the problems. And what we said is that's true, and this [00:23:00] is a massive growth opportunity. Investing in UK infrastructure is a huge opportunity for skills, jobs, finance, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. If we can manage it well, regulate it properly, ensure the benefits flow to the right places in society.
We need to invest tens of billions of pounds in our Victorian infrastructure if we get it right and the right type of investors are investing. So UK pension funds, I. Private sector investors, private sector investors, but blended with government support. Is there government's short,
James: short of cash? At the moment,
Giles: government's very short of cash.
So we don't think that it can go on the UK PLC balance sheet. Of course not. There's too many other competing demands, which are more of a priority, a hundred percent NHS, et cetera. But government has a proper role in creating good solid war tight legislation and regulation, funding the regulator so it can do its job properly, bring people to court, uh, who are polluting, but provide the wider framework for long-term investment.
So investors, I speak to investors all the time and they say, do you know what? It's really simple. [00:24:00] It's really simple. We just need three things. We need a long signal, we need a vision. We need a strategy for this sector that will clean up. The rivers, lakes, and seas, right? If we can have that and have cross party consensus, that's great.
We need a legal signal. So don't just say, this can't just be policy. It needs to be enshrined in law. Bit like with the Climate Change Act, that was a world leading, that was a first. Once we had that Climate change act, business, financiers and others could line up behind it and go, there's an opportunity here.
So long and legal and then loud. We absolutely need to trumpet this signal and say, right, the UK is going to fix this sewage crisis. Once you start to do those three things, which sound really simple and then they're more complex in reality, but once we do that, those interests can line up and we can solve this problem.
'cause this is just an infrastructure problem. This is not as complex as climate change or biodiversity loss or other much more complex problems. This is within our grasp. And the best thing about watery environments, and there's a scuba diving, you might know this, but [00:25:00] watery environments can bounce back quickly.
So if we treat them well, they can be restored. Rapidly.
James: So, Gil, this, this might be unfair question. Go. It's going through my mind. So I'm gonna ask Yeah, go this thing to you. So if, if a headhunter was to ring you up tomorrow and say, Gil, we've got this job, CEO of a major water company, right? Yeah. Would you take it?
Absolutely. No way. No, no way. But you could actually do something about it though, Joe. Why No way though. Why? No way.
Giles: Yeah. So I love my job. I literally job because you love your job. All right, that's good. That's the best job in the country. You could
James: be, you could really drive change, surely as the CEO of a water
Giles: cup.
Yeah. But after sewage, we're moving on. We're working on plastic, sewage, climate change, biodiversity laws, overfishing, you know, you name it, I appreciate you don't wanna
James: leave the job you're
Giles: in, but No, but, but in addition, the CEO of a water company, what are they responding to? And so that's what we've got to get, right?
So at the moment in this privatized system, they're responding to their shareholders, their debt holders, their other, these other forces. Now that's good. And for people who can be motivated and driven by those things, [00:26:00] fine, but we've got to make sure it's going in the right direction. Me personally, I'm driven by.
This community when I'm frequently James, as you can imagine, I mean with policy makers when you are a surfer,
James: aren't you? Yeah,
Giles: yeah, exactly. Yeah. But I mean, with policy makers and policy makers are forever asking us, forever asking why. I mean, why they think a bunch of surfers from Cornwall should have the in inverted.
Business case to solve this problem. I think they're mad, but so I say to them, I can prompt you, probably looking you some help. They need the help. But I say, I can prompt you to ask the right questions. I can. I can help you look in the right places. But at the end of the day, what I'm dealing with is a community who could not give a shit about the business case.
This community loves these places. And the last time I had a meeting with a policymaker, when they said, what, so come on, how are we gonna solve this? What's gonna drive this? And I was like. Quite frankly, you've got an entire nation here who love their watery places, their rivers, lakes, and seas and 'cause they love them, they want them sorted out.
What, what, what other [00:27:00] business case can there be to try? Well it was obviously a vote winner as you said. And it was,
James: I mean, I remember in the election it was a big issue and that's, and people have continue to be very concerned about it. And there seems to be the problems obviously persisting. Yeah. As we go into summer, people wanna be able to swim safely.
And are there any countries you think have really got it right? Who you look around and say, couldn't we be more like X,
Giles: Y, or Z? That is a fascinating question. And I would say there's nowhere that's got everything right. But there are lots of places that got bits of it. Right. So that's not meant to weasel out of the answer parts.
No, no. For example. Yeah.
James: Who are you thinking of?
Giles: Okay, so globally the trend is rem municipalization of water infrastructure. So the blending of public ownership. Is that public? Well, it's a, it's a mix of public and private ownership. Alright. And, um, the reason why that's important is 'cause it comes down to governance.
When you look after. A water body and you look after the water infrastructure, well, you know, 'cause the water flows through the whole infrastructure. So no one really owns the water. They own the processing of the water. When you govern that water and you have your license holder, so your water company, you have your [00:28:00] municipal authority who says, I'm looking after my citizens.
So their public health is important. When you have environmentally I NGOs on that board too and saying, and we are looking after the environment, we're here to represent the environment. When you have community interests who care both about cost, but they also care about their physical environment and the way it feels and access to it as well.
When you have those imbalance in a municipal authority, you can create rapid change. So a good example for this is Paris before the um, Olympics, getting to grips with it and going, oh my goodness. If we want to be able to show the world that we can run an event and swim in the scene, we're gonna have to radically reform this system.
And they did. They move very quickly. How quickly, quickly did they
James: do that?
Giles: Oh, it was, it was a matter of a couple of years or really sorting the system so that shows to be done. Have you? Exactly, yeah. Sort the system out that drives different outcomes and it became safe enough. Okay. They did have a blip along the way, but it became safe enough to hold swimming events in the same, that's a great model.
But then the Danes have got models of really good clean water. I know it's a different size population and this kind of thing, but there's [00:29:00] aspects that can be taken from there. Um, there's aspects that can be taken from all sorts of systems, but what's fascinating for me, coming back to Margaret Thatcher, this comes all background.
They made a
James: big impression on you. She, well, she set in trade a wrong
Giles: or good look. I think she was, in particular time in context, Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan, they were at the kind of birth of sort of new capitalism here and we had the big bang in the city. We had privatization of utilities and stuff.
Wow. I remember that now. Margaret had a vision for a different future. Now that's to be respected. She had visionary, she wanted to plant a lot of trees. Well, and that, no. That kind of thing too. Yeah. But in terms of privatization of social goods and. Public assets. The UK went further than anyone else. The only country in the world, the two have gone as far as us, was paches Chile.
Now that was fascinating. Even Ronald Reagan went, whoa, this is getting a bit too much. So he backtracked a bit on the project of privatization. So we became a global outlier and for a number of years it looked like it was all going well. But then we've had this so it went [00:30:00] too far higher risk, higher. It went too, too far.
We need to swing the dial back. So there's somewhere, in my view, this is a personal view, but there's somewhere between, uh, prioritization and nationalization where there's innovation to be, had innovation in governance, finance, business model, you that municipalization it might be, that's one form, that's a word of it.
Yeah. We there there's a variety of forms in this middle bit here where we need to experiment. The more people are involved. Yeah, yeah, that's right. Very interesting.
James: The word campaigning and communities come up a lot. Yeah. I mean your organization obviously. Created or is part of this great community is very actively campaigning.
Giles: Yeah.
James: I mean, I'm thinking of other smaller charities. Yeah. What's your advice to them? You know, how do you get yourself on the map? Oh, right. You know, you, you, you've done that spectacularly successfully. If someones acting in a, a different space, are there any sort of pointers that they should think about?
Giles: So we, this year we're 35 years old, right? So there's something about that consistency of approach. Since the very [00:31:00] beginning we were established by, uh, a small band of pretty disruptive punky kind of surfers from Cornwall who had meetings in their caravans in St. Agnes Village Hall. They were just fed up with.
Surfing in sewage. Like, and I, and I mean, and I, and I was, uh, I have surfed at that age in those kind of waters where no, I'm the, I'm in the sea. They're
James: literally floaters. That's Yeah,
Giles: exactly. Exactly.
James: You have to keep your mouth shut sort of thing.
Giles: Keep your mouth out in the old classic downer can of Coke when you come out, you know, whether that doesn't any good or not, who knows.
But people got ill in the gill and they're getting moral ill again, now some very seriously. But we built a brand that was based in authenticity. We are all water lovers in surf against sewage and our campaigning, ocean activists, hundreds of thousands of people around the country, all love the water. So at the end of the day, we can speak from a place of, this really matters to us.
So from passion, but an authentic connection to the water. So I think for anyone campaigning on an issue, that's really important. 'cause if you don't have that authenticity, you see [00:32:00] straight through it. And I think that. I dunno. One of the ingredients of our success, I think is that we've been able to mix the shocking.
So the gas mask industry, we got the gas mask on the table here. So that kind of juxtaposition of young people in the water with a gas mask, trying to enjoy surfing with that kinda shocking imagery and shock tactics and some quite hard hitting videos and things that we produce, but with playfulness. So our protest stuff are always fun.
They're always safe in very inclusive places. So I think we've mixed the invitation to invite everyone in, but with a very solid sense of and authentic connection to the water. And that I think is a part of the ingredients of our success also. The truth is, there are many factors that lead to an issue being in the front and center.
So I mentioned COVID earlier, anger at the water companies. If you have a target and it's clear that that target isn't being fair or wielding its power in, in a, in a way that offends people, that galvanizes people to roughly, there's a, there's a number I always [00:33:00] have in my head, but roughly 20% of people in the UK care deeply about environmental issues.
Then you have a massive slug of people who care a lot, but they just perhaps know a lot less, but you're not gonna get them out on the street in the same way just because it's an environmental issue. And so for me, the other bit of the success of Surface against Sewage is, is that bringing together of human health and the power and that kind of conflict with the environmental issue.
And so the challenge. I find, or that I think we have as surface against surgeon to the future is how do we take that same moment we have in relation to sewage now and apply it to more diffuse and incredibly existential issues like climate change. So what are your thoughts
James: on that? I mean, that's not obviously straightforward.
Giles: No, it's not. It's not straightforward. It's very, very difficult just to go and shout about climate change. You're just shouting into the air. It doesn't help. You've still got to have a target in the climate space. Those, um, targets are hugely powerful and the fundamentals of our modern economy, the fossil fuel producers and others.
[00:34:00] But for us, the way into tackling climate change, I think is plastic. So plastic is becoming the justification for the fossil fuel industry of continued need to look for new fossil fuel, reer resources and reserves to exploit it. 'cause plastic is a necessary product in this time. And that's true to some extent, but not to the extent that we are.
Mining to create plastic. So we are going to campaign hard to reduce unnecessary plastic take, take virgin plastic outta the system. We do not need plastic in the way that we are currently producing it, being forced on us by the large fossil fuel producers. So we'll be creating a target there. And then, so then this is sort
James: coming soon, is it?
Giles: Yeah, I'm letting into that. I mean this is well trails for the, the No, no, that's good. No, I'm interested. I This is coming down the line. Definitely. Yeah, go on. Um, because. We work literally with thousands of communities across the country that are going plastic free. We call them plastic free communities.
And plastic free schools. These are people who are deeply, um, motivated and passionate about the [00:35:00] places that they love and seeing them littered in plastic in lots of places. We're very good at cleaning up, literally just taking plastic out that beach. You have a cup
James: of crap campaign. We have a cup of grab, have had their bags collecting rubbish.
That that's, that's right. That trying do locally, right?
Giles: Yeah, that's right. At the moment we have 21 cleans a day happening on a beach around the uk. Right? So every day, day in, day out, 21. So we're taking plastic out the system, but we look at that plastic and we look at the waste. We audit it to see which brands it's come from, right?
And then we use that to lobby the big brands to say, you are ultimately responsible for this waste. It's not going into a circular economy. It's not being recycled properly because we found it in the environment. Mm. Multiple reasons for this. But ultimately you bear responsibility and then we're gonna work our way back up.
Supply chains, you do that.
James: What do they say?
Giles: Well, oh, we're working very hard to reduce, um, the plastics. And we are, we really would like a circular economy. We say, well, really do you because it's possible. But what's happening is the forces acting against us are wanting to ensure that [00:36:00] plastic, there's a diversity of types of plastic.
Now, that's a real problem for a circular economy because sorting plastic is very difficult. Just for the
James: benefit of our listeners, sorry. And, and me. Yeah. Could you explain what a circular economy is? 'cause I, I think I know, but I want you to say,
Giles: best explains for a can to a Coke can. First of all, that aluminum was mined once Boite smelted, we create aluminum made into a can in a circular economy that can, after its use, can be crushed, melted, made back into a can of equal value.
No degradation in its componentry. It remains just as good the hundredth time as a can, as the first time it was a can. So once you've got the can, is that possible? Yeah. Aluminum it is, it
James: is. Now we need to find other, other, other things. So you can just recreate the same can again and again and again and
Giles: make instead of Chucky in the verge, or usually, well, exactly.
So that's in a circuit economy. In the current economy, aluminum is leaking out all over the place. Through, uh, pollution, through littering, but also through process [00:37:00] so we don't have the incentives lined up to make that very worthwhile. That's with aluminum where it's quite easy, but with plastic it's incredibly difficult.
Aluminum, you can literally sort it in a waste, sort it Correct. Gather it. It has a value. Plastic currently doesn't have that value, and that's because there's so many different types of plastic because the fossil fuel industry wants us to keep extracting more oil and gas to create more plastic. So a circular economy.
We're a long way away from it, and unfortunately over half of our plastic at the moment. Gets shipped off to Asia for very home spun cottage industry recycling, right? So it's highly toxic, massively environmentally polluting, but that's what we consider when we put our recycling into the recycling waste.
Unfortunately, that's a lot of our PAs is going off to do that. But the other thing is it can usually be recycled once into a lower value good. And then second time it can't be recycled. So all the dead dinosaurs in those fossil fuels get used, sucked up, used [00:38:00] once, protested, and then it's gone. Fossil fuels are way too valuable to be burnt or thrown away.
We're gonna need them. We're gonna need them for greases and components and medicines and all sorts of things into the future. So to be wasting them like we are at the moment with all the climate impacts and everything else too. So, is,
James: is plastic largely replaceable? I mean, do you think there's alternatives to plastic or there's recyclable plastic?
Is there, what, what is the, we we're not using plastic. 'cause it seems to be so ubiquitous in packaging.
Giles: Yeah, that's right. Yeah.
James: End. I mean, I, I don't think it's plastic, but it seems to be there.
Giles: It is. You are right. It's, it's absolutely ubiquitous. Um, it's everywhere. Oh, and, and now it's ubiquitous in our environment.
We are probably breathing in microplastics right now, and they're going crossing our lungs and into our bloodstream right now. So plastic has become absolutely ubiquitous. But in products, yeah, there's substitution. I mean, we've innovated our way through all sorts of things. There's a lot of unnecessary plastic, and we are getting rid of those single use items.
You know, the government slowly working their way through a [00:39:00] schedule of single use items, the stirs and the plates and the forks and that kind of thing. But there's a load of other stuff in packaging. You know, one of the first pioneers around banning plastic was Kenya. Just saying, we're not gonna have a plastic bag.
Overnight didn't bust the economy at all. Plastic bags came out, and plastic bags are no longer blowing across, you know, the massi Mara, um, and, and polluting. And so we can do this. We just need to identify the problem, put the incentives in place properly, as well as look at how we change consumer behave in the city.
So they
James: ban them completely. Can you ban plastic bags? Did it?
Giles: Yeah. Yeah.
James: So that, why can't other people do that? I mean, that seemed to work. You're saying? I would say this, I have other types of
Giles: bag. I, I'm a campaigner. I would tell you this, but the reason why we don't have such stretching environmental provisions like that is because of the strength of the lobbyists on the other side.
Okay. It's as simple as that.
James: Lobbying is something I wanna talk to you about. Yeah. Yeah. Because I mean, you obviously do your fair share of lobbying too percent. You said on the other side, that's suggest we're transparent about it on the other Yeah. You're transparent. How does that work? I mean, what you said you sit down sometimes with policy makers who [00:40:00] are, how do you get into those rooms and how does that work?
Yeah. And does
Giles: it make a difference? I think it does make a difference. We tend to think of. Systems and organizations as having their own personality. We don't, we think of them as these edifices, these places. They're nothing other than made of people. So if you can get access to those people. Then if you can have a discussion as two human beings, we can change each other's minds.
So that's where I always start from that place. So what do you do? Go to mps surgeries and things? Or do you get your supporters to do well? Supporters and others. So how do we have access? I think it's because there's a recognition in political circles that the public at large across about these issues, they really, I mean, they really, I'm gonna say cross.
They are angry about sewage pollution. They're angry about plastic pollution. So the public, if we're well connected and genuinely and authentically representing the public on their behalf, then we have a reach into parliament for them. But we have, because we have their mandate, and that is something politicians understand [00:41:00] because it's the same currency they work in.
They're only in parliament if they've got the mandate of the people to be there. So we find. And I don't overblow this at all. Like it's, it's like I can just walk up and knock on number's door. No, no, you're explaining. But, but it, but it, but it is almost as simple as when we've had an effective campaign and protest and people have let their mps know, then we are invited in for a discussion because policy makers and mps and parliamentarians know that we're representing people.
It's not just 'cause we walk in this, they've also been getting the emails and they getting the phone calls and they come to the surgery. And so it's a whole collection of stuff that has to come together, but it builds up to a platform. But has
James: that all that effort actually delivered? I. Any meaningful change?
Mm-hmm. From your point of view?
Giles: Yeah, that's a really good question. We can only measure it by the health of our rivers latency. Today things are getting worse, but these levers of policy and finance and big business, they take a while to get into. And you are still putting
James: faith into the process.
Giles: Yes. In relation to sewage, [00:42:00] in relation to climate, I think we're going in the wrong direction.
Um, in relation to plastic. Pollution. It, we are projected to double the amount of plastic going into the planet by 2050. I mean, this is phenomenal given how polluted double the amount
James: of plastic
Giles: by That's right. And is, I mean, I'm, I,
James: I'm, I don't mind telling our listeners. I'm 62 years old. Yeah. This has all happened in my lifetime, the last 50 years.
All this plastic crap everywhere. That's right's. I mean, there wasn't plastic around everywhere when I was a kid. No, that's right. And now it's all over the place. And you are saying it's doubling in the next 50 years if we do nothing
Giles: about it,
James: which is deeply shocking to me because it is definitely wrecked the swats of the planet.
I mean, you go places and you see plastic blowing around in the trees and,
Giles: and, um, I used to work a lot in India in a full job. Well, that's a
James: place I was actually thinking of. Yeah. So I've
Giles: been there recently. It's plastic. Every, you see cows
James: picking their way through plastic and all of that stuff. And the beach
Giles: in, in Mumbai is 12 foot under dense plastic.
The, um, one of the world's largest landfill sites is just outside ma Mumbai. Permanently on fire [00:43:00] with, because of the gases being released by the rotting stuff and it burning the plastic self. It's toxic fumes. I mean, it's just this huge, so plastic is really, yeah. Big problem with my really optimistic hat on James.
Right. Well, you're like an
James: entrepreneur here. I mean, I really admire 'cause you, you are relentlessly optimistic and trying to solve, solve this problem. I'll give this piece of optimism, which is good. I mean, I, I wanna encourage that. Okay. Ly because, you know, there are a lot of problems we see and we've gotta do
Giles: something about them.
I have to be optimistic because it can be very, very, very dark. If we think about the future of humanity and the future of our planet, when we look at the environmental indicators, so what I read on a daily basis is soul destroying. It's gut wrenching. And I've got two, I've got twin daughters. Um, they are 12 and they are gonna inherit an absolutely broken planet.
Some of my optimism comes from the fact that they ask the right questions. Dad, why is this like this? And it's almost like that. And we adopt that naive spirit of it doesn't mean to be like this in your lifetime. James, you said there's plastic everywhere. This was a new system. The [00:44:00] plastic didn't exist before we created it.
We innovated it. We weren't aware of, well, we collectively weren't aware of the impact that production of plastic was having on the planet. Now we know sustainability should be the driver for a massive amount of. Growth in human wellbeing and the planet, like we can all benefit from new industry, new technologies, new processes, new governance forms.
There is a bur a rebirth of humanity that can happen based on tackling these issues. So my optimism comes from human beings are incredible in genius and you know, necessity is the mother of invention and we can reinvent our society in a much more sustainable way that allows us to relate to the planet in a much more positive way and relate to each other in, in a much more positive way.
So, so I am optimistic, but I think we're gonna go through some terrible, terrible times before we get there.
James: Well, I want to sign up your campaign Great. Right now because I hate plastic. Good, good. I, I know it's [00:45:00] necessary sometimes. Yeah. But it's caused a, you know, really mess everywhere. Yeah. But what about, um, other methods, you know, what about just stop oil?
What do you think about their activities? 'cause you know, they're in the same space as an organization. They deploy different methods. What do you think about that?
Giles: Quite often disruption is what is required, and I think just stop. Oil is disruptive and have been disruptive.
James: Well, people know about them, I guess people
Giles: know about it and cause people to think and cause people to get crossed with them.
But they then know about them. So, um, XR is another organization that caused an awful of disruption. Extinction rebellion. Extinction rebellion. Yeah.
James: Yeah. Now, but they sort of gone quiet or respectable or something. What's happened with their disruption?
Giles: I mean, yes, you are absolutely right. I said the truth is I don't really know where XR at now.
Extinction Rebellion, but I think. For two years, they literally stopped us in our tracks in London and other places. It felt like, oh, are we on this tipping point? You know, where people were literally gluing themselves to Trafalgar Square and the traffic was stopped.
James: I
Giles: [00:46:00] suppose
James: you
Giles: can
James: glued to so many things before
Giles: you
James: Well, that's right.
Skin left or so. That's
Giles: totally true. But also the response from government was to crack down on environmental campaigning big time. So a lot of that is a lot more of that nature. Of that nature. Yeah. Yeah.
James: I mean, it's very annoying to London that's trying to go about their business. It's, I know, I love that saying that to you as a guest from Cornwall.
Yeah, I know. Exactly. But go on. Yeah, I think there's
Giles: some place for this. Oh, a hundred percent. So when I think back to our origin story, surface against stage, they were punky disruptors acting from the outside saying this isn't good enough, and driving a wedge into the status quo in theoretical terms. So in the kind of campaigning theory, what we're all trying to do the whole time is do something called shifting the Overton window.
Now this is a theory
James: shifting the Overton window. I dunno, this theory, I wanna know it, what is it? So it's, it's really basic,
Giles: but it's basically what window are we looking through on a problem? And then as we think about the solutions, what is the acceptable response? So the [00:47:00] shifting the window metaphor is if we look at climate change is an adequate response just to electrify all cars.
But the campaigners are saying the just stop oil. And others are saying, no, no, no, no. We've actually got to stop oil extraction here, otherwise we are doomed. So their campaign shifts. What is the adequate response from, oh, a few more EV through to right. The uk you need to ba we need no more new extraction licenses in the North Sea.
'cause that's the only way we can tackle climate. So successful campaign is shifting that window. Why is it called Overton? Is that someone who thought I, he's a chap who came up with that, uh, you know, sort of theorist.
James: So it's about changing people's sort of, uh, mindset and of what looking, looking and,
Giles: but also moving in many respects from end of pipe solutions.
Oh, there's a thing. Let's clean it up to a systemic response. Ah, let's get to that root cause. This shouldn't be the way, let's tackle this differently. Let's drive this system in a different way. Let's look for different outcomes. [00:48:00] So as campaigners, that's what we're always trying to do. So I have huge respect for Just Stop Oil and Extinction Rebellion and others.
I've been an Extinction Rebellion is myself, joined a lot of those protests in marches. Um, because at the time it felt like the only rational thing I could do to get my voice. Publicly with others Heard joining Surface against Sewage. I have a similar sense of that, but we are a charity. We're regulated by the Charity Commission.
We would never do anything illegal. We would never do anything that would Well, you jeopardize your status. We jeopardize our status, but also we, I think we'd lose part of the brand. Right? And part of what makes us attractive. So I would, we would never do anything like that. But we have done things that are on the edge.
Like last year we created a brilliant, I would say, a brilliant campaigning video. And we projected it at midnight onto the Houses of Parliament, all about, we are watching you. You've promised to sort this, uh, switch crisis out. We projected a film. We filmed the film we projected I saw that. Yeah. I really thought that was good.
And, and you know, technically that was anti your bylaw of Westminster [00:49:00] and Yeah, I was gonna
James: ask you how you do that. So you can't tell me.
Giles: Well, I can tell you as much as you've just gotta have good friends,
James: lot people want to project things. Our pardon? Listening. Probably
Giles: I, when we switch these microphones off our telly jokes, but Okay.
But no, but that sort of thing is a lot of fun. It galvanizes our supporters. People love it. And we hope we cause no damage. We definitely would never wanna cause damage. I love, you know, but wanna inspire people that, you know, campaigning is fun and creative. So you, you,
James: you have to be creative in terms of getting a message across clearly.
Yeah. So what about, I mean, we've talked about businesses that pollute and I mean the, there are businesses that are trying to improve their performance, aren't there? And you've worked with some, I believe. Yeah, absolutely. Could you gimme an example of what you've done and because I, I want to encourage other ERs who are in business to think about these issues and perhaps change their approach.
Where possible, you know, if appropriate or what, what examples might you be able to share where people have done that? Well, look, I
Giles: think there are all sorts of examples from the big businesses. So there are businesses who are trying to understand their [00:50:00] impact and then I. Trying to build that into their business model.
So we are thinking of the Unilevers and this kind of thing. They say we are setting global goals to reduce our environmental impact. So
James: Unilever, huge company. Yeah. Reduces a lot
Giles: of, uh, products,
James: fast
Giles: moving consumer
James: goods, packaging and
Giles: loads of packaging and this kind of thing.
James: Well, so what are they doing and what have you done with them?
Giles: So when I was at Forum for the Future, so another organization, uh, we worked with 'em on strategy. So it was very much about how you inspired the business, that change is necessary and doable and to set targets that perhaps didn't feel doable, but were aspirational to drive business innovation and, and change.
Myself and lots of others at Forum for the Future, worked with the likes of Unilever and many other businesses to try to create that case and push and encourage senior people. Paul Pullman was the champion here and he got it. He understood it. Paul very much knew that if they did nothing, Unilever's own business model.
Was going to eat up Unilever. You can't keep extracting and polluting in [00:51:00] expecting this to go on forever. You're gonna lose the public, uh, license to operate. At some point you're gonna run up against environmental laws, but also, you know, the future just won't allow you. The planet won't light, so therefore you've got to move.
Now that's enlightened self-interest of a business and there are very few businesses that are genuinely like that, but we can think of some great ones like Patagonia and others. Mm-hmm. Ineos the floor, um, in, sorry, uh, not Ineos, not Ineos at all, but the, the floor, um, I can now can't remember what they're called.
They make a lot of the floors we have in offices. So rather than if you spill a cup of coffee and you damage your floor, having to rip the whole that out, you have floor tiles. It's that kind of looking at business models for sustainability and going, ah. If we wanna have a lower impact, we could design differently.
So we've worked lots of businesses like that at Surfers Against Sewage. We work with lots of small and medium insight, uh, enterprises that are challenges. So doing things like taking old, uh, waste, discarded fishing nets, extracted from the ocean, um, gathered by local fishermen, turning that into a waste stream that [00:52:00] is valuable and making sunglasses or other recycled plastic products.
That's the kind of thing we need to both try and power down the big bad businesses that are doing things that are ultimately unsustainable, and then power up and support businesses that can be part of a future economy. And then in the middle. There are most businesses, there's a huge RU of most business that has a lot of environmental impact, but is providing jobs and powering our economy.
And so we need to get that bit right in the middle, but where people are polluting in knowledge of the effect that they're having on the planet and lobbying against environmentalists and the public, I think that's where we have to really quickly sort that out. 'cause that's just not right. Is that a big
James: problem?
I mean, do you think there are lots of companies actively in that space?
Giles: Yes. I think there are very few businesses that triple bottom line account to account for their, you know, profit and loss. Plus the environmental profit and loss and social. The more businesses do that, the more they understand their impacts and then go, oh, perhaps we should do something about this triple accounting.
Triple, triple bottom line. Yeah, [00:53:00] triple bottom line. Yeah.
James: That's what you call it. Well, that's good. Just stepping back for a moment, looking at your own organization, surfers against you SAS. Yeah, I mean it's sort of one's a military organization. I know Then it's you guys. Often when I am, when I'm
Giles: asked by someone from my email address and I'm spelling it out to them on the phone, they go, oh, you're in the SAS.
No, no, no, no. Really not. It's quite clever in a way, you know?
James: I think they're both strong brands. That right, that's right. Initials and you talked about the creating this community is community and brand. Overlaid for you? Is that the same? How do you think about the brand?
Giles: Yeah, that's a, that's a really good question.
And I think, yeah, I think they really are interwoven, not even though they are mutually dependent, I think there's something about surfing that is attractive. It is that kind of, um, disruptor, outsider enjoying nature, um, doing something sporting and athletic. There is something very kind of, and the culture around surfing has always been attractive.
I think when you take that and build a community. Of purpose around it. [00:54:00] Those two things can be really, really powerful. Yeah. I would say the majority of our supporters and members aren't surfers, but they're attracted to the brand. They love the ocean, and it's the association with that brand that there is yes, positive creative.
That's really, really good. I'm very, very powerful. So the community element for me, you couldn't lose one or the other. So a nurturing both is. Most of my mind more time. I must ask you
James: this because it's sort of on my mind, but have these new developments in technology changed your approach to campaigning or reaching people or have you done anything creative using Seen new tech.
I mean, we use a
Giles: lot of visual media. We use or projecting
James: on the House of Commons, good example,
Giles: projections and that kind of thing. And we've projected onto the, uh, white cliffs of Dover plastic pollution images and things like that. So bringing together disruptive and interesting creative visuals with music and other artistic forms that is powerful and speaks to the soul.
That's when we really connect with people. 'cause you're actually, we're trying to connect with those values that people hold dear, aren't they? And your events, um, recently are Earth raise. Earth [00:55:00] raise. Now that was powerful as well because you used creative forms to tap into us as human beings. Yeah. Not just tell us stuff, but used, used comedy, used music, used light and sound.
To make us feel something. So that's what we are trying to do.
James: Thank you for mentioning Earth for, I dunno, it's very kindly because this is a campaign that we're doing with Big Give a charity we wanna raise for World Earth Day next year to raise a lot more money for environmental and nature charities that work all around the world.
So watch this space. I mean, for listeners we're looking for some, uh, big sponsors. We are looking for a good streamer and we are looking for some great stars to perform. Yeah, because I think that connection of music, everyone rather, like, everyone loves to sea, everyone loves music. It's absolutely different types of music and James, different types of weather on the ocean, I suspect with new surfers like it story, but,
Giles: but I love, um, so you've been asking me a lot of questions about what it's like to be a campaigner and to have bold and ambitious, you know, ambition that maybe is beyond our reach.
[00:56:00] But I think you are doing something similar with, uh, earth raise, which is amazing, which is saying. We absolutely need to channel more money into the environment because at the moment, about 8% of philanthropy, so of. Capital Philanthropy is a small part, and then 8% of that small part goes to the environment.
Majority of that goes into single species issues. So again, what is available for other organizations? Very small. So what you are doing in setting a stall out and saying, Hey, we can go about this in a different way, and we must absolutely must raise money for the environment in a different way that connects people to it.
I, I personally, you know, it's amazing.
James: I feel the same way as you. I think that's, there's a great groundswell of support and. From people for that. Yeah. And people want that to happen. And, uh, if we can create a, a, a way of enabling that through match funding with a big give and yeah. A big campaign called Earth Raise, then let's give it a shot.
Yeah. I mean, like you, I want to try Yeah. And see if it, it [00:57:00] works and we can make a difference. Yeah. So that's our campaign for next year. Yeah. Have you got anything you wanna share Coming up? You mentioned your. Party in St. Agnes on the 5th of July. Yeah,
Giles: so do, do, do, do. So yeah, we have party in St. Agnes, 5th of July.
We've got space for 3000 people, so it'd be quite epic. So you can
James: sign up for that if you want. You can sign up for it right now. Tickets
Giles: are available. Um, and we, we would love to welcome anybody and everybody. You don't have to be a surfer. You don't have to be an SAS member. Uh, if you love the ocean and you want to celebrate the ocean with a bunch of other people who love the ocean, come and join us.
So 5th of July is Agnes Headland. Sign up on the, uh, on our website. Uh, and we'd love to welcome you. We've got campaigning things going on in the rest of the year, so we will be doing a lot around the next set of legislation. Mm-hmm. Um, that comes outta the recommendations of the water, um, commission.
We're going to be doing a, some big, um, very public protesting around plastic towards the end of the year. So we're gonna do some big cleans and turn that into protest as well, which will be fun and creative. So they're gonna be, um, really, really good fun. And then I. [00:58:00] We are gonna be moving through elections in the devolve nations over the next couple of years.
So, uh, Wales, Northern Ireland, and Scotland. And, uh, we probably might whip out the double decker bus again and we'll be doing tours and when we go on tour, it's about music, it's about partying and paddling out together and protesting and engaging politically. So look out for us, come and join us. Yeah, that's gonna be good fun.
James: That sounds great. Well, thank you so much. I'm, I'm looking forward to reading your comments on the commission's findings. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. I gonna say that's not enough. Exactly. That's over. No, exactly. I, I applaud what you're doing. Thank you. And, and I'm inspired by your enthusiasm and, um, thank you optimism, which is, uh, really encouraging.
So, Giles, I always ask two questions at, at the end. Yeah. And, um, my first question, there's a clue on the wall here, but what is it that gets you up on a Monday morning?
Giles: Oh gosh. I mean, apart from the very obvious thing that I absolutely love my job, but the reason I love my job is our mission is the right mission right now.
It's [00:59:00] current, it's public. I, I, I talk to so many people about it in the supermarket to the, you name it, where I am. If I'm wearing this t-shirt, people come up to me and talk to me about it. Your t-shirt for everyone. Oh, right. Says surfers again. Sewage. That's right. You go. It's very
James: smart. Yeah.
Giles: Thank you. So I love my job, but I love my job because the mission is right.
I have a fantastic team. I honestly, I have a brilliant, brilliant team. They are fun, they're creative, they're young, they spirited and, um, optimistic. Um, and at the same time hugely driven. So, I mean, I literally, I could not ask for a better, um, set of people to work with. I have a brilliant board of trustees as well, uh, who are hugely committed and right behind the mission and will do anything to support it.
But add that up. That's probably 70 people altogether. But what I really love is this huge movement of ocean activists around the country who support us with individual membership. But they come out at paddle outs, they join us on the street when we go do protests, they do the litter picking and cleaning with us, [01:00:00] and they write their mps and, and, and, and, and, and being part of that is full of hope and joy.
And so that, that's, yeah. So I love my Mondays for all of those reasons. That's fantastic.
James: And my last question, which is an interview question from my book, why you Right. But is where do you see yourself in five years time? Oh gosh.
Giles: Well, I hope still surfing, although my knees are getting creaky. Um, so where do I see myself?
I mean, I very much hope to still be with Surfers Against Sewage having won some big things. And we are moving on and we are moving through in some perhaps more difficult spaces like, uh, overfishing, like biodiversity loss, like climate change. And I hope that we can see a trajectory to winning those. So if I'm doing that in five years times, I'll, I, I'll, I'll be well happy
James: and we'll be making progress by the end.
I think that's right. That's, thanks Charles. Thanks very much for coming in to talk to me today. It's been a great pleasure for me. And I'm gonna go swimming as soon as I can. Super. Yeah. On the basis of what you've said.
Giles: Well, thank you James. Thank you. And again, I just want to thank you for your support for Surface Skin [01:01:00] Sew.
It means so much. Um, so yeah, thank you. It's a real pleasure. Thank
James: you very much. Thank you, Giles, for joining me on all about business. I'm your host, James Reed. I. Chairman and CEO of Reed, a family run recruitment and philanthropy company. If you'd like to find out more about Reed Giles and Surfers Against Sewage, all links are in the show notes.
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